Speak of the Devil, and the Devil Appears

Today I was out of my classroom, at the district office, scoring the Quarter Writing Prompt— the on-demand essay that students write so that the district can gauge improvement in writing. Or, that's the official reason.

Anyway, I was to be gone two days, so designed a lesson plan that kept my students productive, but was easy for a substitute to administer, no easy feat (see my earlier post, Eeiny Meeiny, Miney Mo, for my take on substitute teachers).

When I announced to my classes that I'd be gone a couple of days, they naturally asked me if I knew who the substitute teacher was going to be (which I didn't), and of course, offered stories about other "subs" who remained in their memory. They mentioned one whom they described to me as, well, a doofus. A mouth-breather. They offered anecdotes of horror about what he'd done in other classes. Much of it revolved around personal hygeine. From their stories, I divined that they had no respect for him.

Guess who walks in my door this morning? Mr. Doofus.

Well, my lesson plan was pretty fool-proof (no pun intended): all it required was the ability to take roll, read a few instructions to the class, and have enough of a presence to keep kids quiet enough for the class to be productive. He even had the power of marking stinkers on the seating chart for decapitation later. Not much more needed than an opposing thumb, really. But still I worrried.

I rushed back on campus after school to discover that the room wasn't thrashed. Most of the work was done (sophomores seem to have accomplished more than juniors). and nothing was missing or had been broken. Not bad, actually. I was relieved.

He didn't leave much of a note for me, and there were no "off-task" marks on the seating chart. I can't believe that every kid was so sobered by my detention threats left on the board that no one had to "get a check." So I'm sure some kids got away with something, and even if I enlist my squealers informants, I won't be able to punish anyone on just that testimony. I'll be limited to "I heard you misbehaved," in an I'm-just letting-you-know-that-I-know-what-you-did way, to take half the joy out of their self-satisfied "I got away with it!" smirking. It's the least (and apparently, the most) I can do.

So Mr. Doofus turned in a lukewarm performance, and earns a C+ or so. Randy gives him props, Dawg; Paula tells him to keep his dream alive; Simon, with arms crossed, thinks he's simply awful. Not terribly bad; but I'll never request him (he did leave a sticker with his name on it for my future consideration. Sorry, Bub: you're not sadistic firm enough to do it the way I want it done.

Another teacher told me that he spent the 30–minute lunch period asleep, or at least head down, at my desk. But that's his time.

I should have locked my desk.